Liquor Love
by civettaanda
Summary: Fai drinks to forget. Sometimes he forgets to forget. KuroFai. AU.
1. Chapter 1

_Attitude en pointe, balançoire_, _attitude à la seconde_, _chassé, sauté, ballon, grand jeté, _breath in, breath out, breath in, breath out, keep steady, keep time, keep focus.

In one last swift move, thin yet strong pale arms captured the girl as she propelled her body into the air and lifted her form above his blond haired head. His blue eyes sparkled, gazing into green ones. The movements stopped and loud cheering from the only other occupant in the room errupted, clapping, and calls of, "Simply beautiful, Sakura-chan!" and "That was incredible, Fai-san!" echoed through the room as the music on the CD player faded out. The blond man placed the girl back onto the padded flooring and they hugged, another rehearsal well done. He walked to the CD player to pop out the CD before it continued on into the next track.

"Thank you, Tomoyo-chan," Fai practically sang, pleased with how he felt after he rehearsed.

He looked at Sakura with a smile as she removed her ratted out point shoes and threw them into a bag of at least twenty others. She smiled back at the man, tying the bag closed and ready to put away until tomorrows rehearsals. She then pulled out her phone, turning it back on. Her biggest pet peeve, she discovered over her years of ballet classes, was when one of the dancer's phones was on during their rehearsals and rang with new phone calls, text messages, and e-mails. Therefore, she turned hers off, as did Fai and even Tomoyo, respecting her wishes. Sakura noticed she had two missed calls from her brother, Touya, and a new voicemail. She listened then groaned, deleting the message to get rid of the annoying icon in the upper corner of the screen. Even if she had listened to the voicemail five times, her phone would still alert her that it was new.

"What's wrong, Sakura-chan?" Fai asked to girl, packing away his own shoes and taking off his sweaty shirt, exposing his thin yet muscular frame, muscles moving underneath as he moved to unpack a small towel, clean tank top and sweater out of his bag, setting them out onto the floor along with the sweaty t-shirt he had just removed. Tomoyo's violet eyes shared the same question as the man.

He wiped the excess sweat off of his form before deciding to continue rehearsing after the girl left, repacking the tank top and sweater and going to stretch out his legs on the _barre _along the mirror, still shirtless, as Sakura replied, "My big brother can't make it to the dress rehearsal tomorrow! And I was so excited to see him there too!"

She looked close to crying and she threw her cell phone at the bag packed with point shoes. She hadn't seen her brother in a long while since they had went their seperate ways and her being in both college and the dance academy did not help her to plan her time for her brother. She always seemed to be busy when he was free and he was busy when she was free. The only time they were both free was when they were sleeping and for both their occupations, they needed their sleep. Sakura was always paranoid that if she sleep even a few minutes less than the eight hours of sleep she required of herself, she would pass out when she was dancing. Fai had tried to tell her that she was just over-reacting, knowing that she wouldn't, seeing as he always got at most six hours of sleep a night. Sakura was a wonderful girl though.

"That's too bad," Tomoyo sighed, she was also hoping to see Sakura's brother. She and Sakura had been friends since high school and Touya was a wonderful brother and friend. "Oh! You reminded me that I forgot to ask my brother to come tomorrow!"

"Tomoyo-chan, you have a brother?" Fai wondered aloud, having worked with the girl for at least three years and never knowing she had a brother.

She giggled, "Yes, an elder brother. Though he is usualy too interested in his martial arts competitions to bother with the shows I work in, but not this time! There isn't a competition for at least a month and he can't get away this time!" Her eyes sparkled with a devilish shine that made Fai chuckle nervously. Along with the fact that this was one of the first shows that she had worked on mostly by herself. She had been working as an assistant to the lead customer for the past few shows and finally, _finally_, the lead costumer had let her costume the main characters of this performance and she was so excited.

"Before you get all excited," Fai began, cleaning out all the worst shoes from his own shoe bag and placing them to the side, "You should probably call him to make sure he can come."

Tomoyo laughed nervously and agreed.

"Well, I'm leaving!" Sakura called. She had changed out of her tights and shorts and into a long sleeved pink dress with fur along the cuffs and seams and a brown sleeveless, woven vest on the outside. Her legs were covered in brown boots and her brown hair covered head was snuggled into a brown, cream, and pink beanie with a little ball of fur on the top, matching the fur on her dress. One could tell she was prepared for the winter, unlike Fai, who usually only dressed in a tank top and thin sweater with a pair of jeans. The cold didn't effect him much during the day and was even caught wearing flip-flops in the middle of Decemeber down the street on his way to the store a few times.

"Have a good evening, Sakura-chan!" the blonde man called changing back into his sweaty t-shirt. He wanted to get his jumps perfect before the dress rehearsal tomorrow. Tomoyo and Sakura had endlessly told him that they were perfect, but he wasn't so sure of himself. Practice makes perfect, even if perfect doesn't exist.

"See you tomorrow!" Tomoyo called, hugging the girl before she left then running back to grab her cell phone and call her brother. "Fai-san, would you rather me talk outside?" she asked the man, as he lowered himself onto the floor into a split.

"I don't mind, Tomoyo-chan," he said, smiling sweetly to the girl. The collar of his shirt was worn and stretched so it fell in front of his form when he leaned forward in her direction, exposing his slightly sweaty chest to the younger girl, causing her to blush a little. He didn't notice as he turned around to stretch away from the mirror, bending over to touch his toes. This didn't help Tomoyo as her innocent eyes were pulled right to his ass. She turned around to look out the window, blushing madly.

"Focus, Tomoyo, focus! Call your brother and don't look at Fai!" she whispered to her reflection in the window, mentally slapping herself, pretending to preoccupy herself with fixing her long, black hair in the reflection of the glass before opening her phone.

"Did you say something?" Fai called, moving to the far side of the room, getting ready to launch into his first jump.

"Nothing, Fai-san, nothing," she called back, scrolling to her brother's name in her phone's contact list and pressing the "call" button. She held the device to her ear and waited for him to pick up as she gazed at the blond man, watching Fai do flawless leaps into the air.

The man was truly beautiful.

* * *

Elbow, jab, knee strike, jab, round house, block, block, jab, elbow, breath, breath, breath, _focus_.

Arms up to his chest, fists in front of his face, he ducked under a punch from the woman in front of him before aiming to jab her in the stomach. She turned, moving around him to strike him with her palm in the back of his head. He ducked again, ready to swipe his foot under her legs as she jump and kicked him in the chest, knocking him to the ground. He rolled out of the way before she could strike again and with the ringing of the bell, they both stopped and turned to the door of the building. The woman, not recognizing the pair, an elderly man and young boy, most likely his son, standing in the doorway, welcomed them.

"Good evening! Welcome to Souma's Martial Arts Academy! I'm Souma, is there anything I can help you with?" she questioned the two, her dark eyes sparkling. She loved new students.

"Oi, Souma! Where'd you put my water bottle!" the man who was sparring with her called.

She smiled at the two in the door way before turning to him, "Stop being stupid, Kurogane, it's right where you left it!" She pointed to the counter and there sat a water bottle with a dragon swirling around it. Souma turned back around, short, dark, brown hair pinned into a pony-tail swished slightly with the movement, and she apologized to the two before leading them to her office in the back of the building.

As the two disappeared into the office, Kurogane spotted his cell phone with red-brown eyes trying to migrate south for the winter while he took a drink of water from the bottle. It vibrated with an incoming call, scooting closer and closer to the edge of the counter until it almost fell before he swiftly grabbed it and flipped it open, holding onto his ear, forgetting to check to see who it was.

"Hello?" he grunted into the phone. He hated talking to people over the phone, but it was the fastest way of communicating.

"Kurogane?" an eager and familiar voice called out. He could sense the smile on the other end of the line.

"Tomoyo-hime?" he said.

"Ah, Kurogane, how many times have I told you to stop calling me that!" Tomoyo whined on the phone.

Kurogane grinned, "That'll always be your name to me," he said. He heard a puff of air as she sighed.

"Fine," he could see her pouting.

"Why the call?"

"Are you busy tomorrow?" she asked, hope filling her vocal chords, "The dress rehearsal for the academy's winter performance is tomorrow night and I'd really like if you went! It's the first show I did almost completely on my own!" She remembered all the nights she spent in the costume room, sewing various tu-tus and coats, dying fabrics in the kitchen turned tie-dye center, and ironing fabrics.

"Ehh..." Kurogane thought about it. He wasn't really a big fan of ballet and though he did love his sister and knowing she was almost as good as a professional costumer, he still would rather not go. "I don't know, Tomoyo-hime..." he trailed.

"It-it's alright if you don't go! It's just that it's..." she trailed off also, not knowing what to say. Disappointment dripped in her voice.

He thought about it as he ran a large, tan hand through his short, spikey, black hair. He hasn't seen her work in motion since he came back from China at least a few years ago when she was helping the drama club at her high school with the costumes for their production of Alice in Wonderland. He had been so busy with competitions and practice, he barely got to see his sister anymore. But it was ballet. Dancing, prancing, fairy dust, _ballet. _But then, it was also his sister, his sweet, wonderful, little hime, sister.

"Kurogane?" Tomoyo echoed into the phone, "Are you still there? Kuroooganeee?"

"Huh?" he grunted, not realizing that there hadn't been any interaction for a few minutes. He reached for the small towel in his back pack and wiped his face clean of sweat.

"Will you please come?" she asked again.

He sighed, for his sister, "Of course I'll be there, Tomoyo-hime."

"Thank you so much, Kurogane!" she chimed happily. He heard a voice in the background but could not distinguish the words. "He said he'll be there!" she sang to the voice, who responded back, still a mumble to Kurogane.

"Who was that?" Kurogane asked, curious.

"Oh, just one of the performers I'm working with," she replied, "I have to go. He's about to leave and I'm not about to be left in this building with Yuuko," she shuddered on the other end of the phone and there was a low wind chime of laughter in the background.

"Bye, hime," he said.

"Good night, Kurogane," Tomoyo said, hanging up the phone.

Kurogane closed his phone at the dial tone. He went into the practice room to practice his round house kicks before heading out of the academy to his car, ready to go home for a relaxing shower.

"Practice makes perfect!" Souma always told him.

He snorted, a round house kick being launched almost knocking over the practice dummy as he thought about that saying.

Perfect doesn't exist.

* * *

The next night, Kurogane went to pick up his sister from the dance academy building. He didn't know weither or not to dress up, so he pulled on a black, button up shirt and tucked it into a pair of dark jeans and loafers. A thick blazer was thrown in the back seat of his car. When he glanced outside of the window, he was glad that he had pulled on something nice because his sister looked absolutely stunning in her dress.

It was dark purple with long sleeves, a high collar that was bottoned up from the wasit up, a thick black belt tightened around her to express her figure and draped down into three layers and at the ends of each layer, little strings of black hung, the longest layer ending at half of her calves, the rest of her legs covered in black boots with an inch of heel. Her arms were tucked into a thin, black blazer, similar to that of a male's, but shorter, ending between her waist and hips, also shaped to outline her curves. A small black top hat adorned her head with a purple ribbon tied around it with the assistance of a headband. Her long black hair hung in curls around her body. She was definetly Kurogane's little hime.

The man was too focused on his sister to notice another male was standing with her until he too got into the car. His sister hopped into the passenger's seat next to Kurogane, leaning over to kiss her brother on the cheek before clipping in her seatbelt.

"Kurogane, brother, this is my friend Syaoran," she said, gesturing to the back seat to the brown haired, brown eyed boy.

He sat nervously, but reached out to shake Kurogane's hand, "It's nice to meet you, Kurogane-san."

Kurogane reached back to take the hand and shook it, nodding to the boy as if repeating the statement. He turned back around to continue driving, according to Tomoyo's directions to the performance hall. Once they parked not to far from the hall, they were early as Tomoyo wanted to go backstage really quick and wish everyone luck, so they got a really good spot and free parking. Inside the hall, Tomoyo showed the woman at the ticket booth the pass she had and the two males followed suit, going into the auditorium.

"Go find seats and I'll be right back. I'm going back stage!" Tomoyo called, running to a door, exiting the auditorium to go into the wings of the stage and to the back.

"Wish Fai-san good luck for me!" Syaoran called after her and a faint call of "Okay!" met their ears.

A man on a violin stood on the stage in front of the curtains, playing familiar classical tunes and Christmas instrumentals as people filled into the area. They quickly found seats, Kurogane setting his blazer down on the seat next to him for Tomoyo and Syaoran sat on the other side of the blazer so that the girl can sit in between them.

"So, who do you know in the performance?" Kurogane asked, after a long period of silence, attempting to block out the violin. He wasn't really a people person, but he attempted to get along with friends of Tomoyo's so that she was never upset with him.

"My roommate, uh, Fai-san," Syaoran said, a bit surprised at the sudden conversation, "Who do you know?"

"Just my sister..." Kurogane said. "What do you mean by roommates? Are you guys in college?"

"Ah, I am but he isn't. He's older than me and it was the only place available closer to the school. We live in an apartment about a mile from the college."

"What do you study?"

"Archeology," Syaoran said, you can sense some pride in his response and his brown eyes lit up. He was really serious about this major.

Kurogane smirked, he liked this kid. He nodded and turned his attention to the stage as the man stopped playing the violin and was testing the microphone. He spotted the shadowed figure of Tomoyo briskly walking back towards them. Syaoran waved to get her attention and she squeezed through people to get to her seat. Syaoran and Kurogane had picked the best seats in the entire hall.

The man announced the performance and walked off the stage. The faint tapping of the composer in the orchestra pit was heard through the silence and the music started, the curtains raising and the dancers began their performance.

After about an hour of performance, there was a brief intermission and it continued. Towards the end there was a scene, one would guess to call it, with just a male and female dancing a duet piece. Kurogane was really impressed with the costumes for this performance, each with much detail and exactly the correct fit for each performer. Kurogane leaned into his sister and with a very low whisper, he asked, "You really made all of these by hand?"

She muffled a giggle in her hand, "Mostly. Just a little help from my mentor."

"They're incredible!" he said, gasping as the male on stage tossed the ballerina into the air, spun and caught her without breaking a sweat. "Who's that girl? Is that Sakura-chan?"

"Yes," Tomoyo smiled, admiring her best friend on stage.

"She's grown a lot."

Tomoyo smiled and looked at Syaoran, seeing how he enjoyed the performance and she could see that he only had eyes for Sakura. She smiled sweetly at his gaze. Love at first sight was real. She couldn't wait to tell Sakura later. She turned back to her brother, leaving Syaoran to his stare. "The man on stage is my friend, Fai-san. He was the one with me yesterday," Tomoyo informed. "Don't tell any other dancers, but I think he's my favorite!"

Kurogane gave a little glare to the male on stage as Tomoyo playfully punched his arm, "Not like that!"

He smirked and again turned his gaze to the stage, looking at this "Fai-san." He moved with grace, flowing around Sakura like water around a rock in a river. His foot steps as he leaped and praced on the gloss wooden floor barely gave any more noise than a snowflake landing did. The music went incredible well with this part. The blond hair, neatly pulled back and held with various hair pins and hair stray to keep from falling into his face. The costume Tomoyo had designed for him was a full body white leotard, sewn with intricate designs on the legs and didn't leave much to the imagination between his thighs. Over the top of the leotard, which was completely white, was a light coat, equally as detailed. All of it was colored in blues, greys, black and white with hints of gold in between. The colors of the costume brought out the bright blues of his eyes, which Kurogane could even see from his seat in the audience. A content smile was on Fai's face the entire performance. He looked content, peaceful, happy. He wore black over his feet, but Kurogane didn't know if they were socks or shoes or what. Tomoyo later informed him on what they were.

Syaoran still looked up on the beauty of Sakura. He brown hair was was pulled back also, but with a blue ribbon, matching the blue of Fai's costume, and detailed with white and silver and gold swirls and snowflakes. Her dress was that of the plain tutu you see ballerinas wear in children's books, but in the same colors, and the tutu part of the costume was in the shape of a snowflake, as you could see when Fai lifted her at a certain angle. Her white point shoes were new, and untampered like freshly fallen snow.

The lights were blue, giving their skin an odd tinge of color but other wise fit in. At the end of performance, Sakura leapt high into the air with all of her might and Fai caught her, landing into a lunge and holding her body above his head, their eyes gazed deep into each other and they leaned in for a kiss but before the audience could see if they kissed or not, the curtains clsoed and the music faded off.

The crowd cheered, begging for more. Many people stood, Tomoyo and Syaoran included. Kurogane clapped, but slowly, a little stunned. All of a sudden, he was a bit more interested in ballet. Or rather, he was bit interested in a certain blond ballerino.

Perfect did exist.

* * *

**_Hello, owls:_**

**_Wow_, I haven't written fanfiction in years. So long that I forgot my old password and fanfiction won't even send me a reset email (xtremekiiwii was my old account). This is my first fanfiction in years, plus my first Tsubasa Chronicle fiction, and being an AU. I really hope you all like it. I really look forward to writing and keeping it up. Fai is such a wonderful character. I wrote the plot, it should be around nine chapters and an epilouge. Also, please excuse any if at all spelling errors, my spelling can be terrible. I've been working on a laptop without Microsoft Word and it's _awful!_ When I get back onto a computer with Word I'll check through and fix them.**

**Also note; I'm not sure if the ballet terms are correct, having not taken an type of ballet class in 12 years. I found the terms on Wikipedia. Wikipedia is beautiful.**

**Please and review ****and tell me what you think! I'll post the next chapter next week. :)**

**- Civetta**

**Word count: 3,769**


	2. Chapter 2

The three waited for the commotion to settle down in the performance hall before Tomoyo lead them to the door that had taken her backstage before the beginning of the performance but when the door was opened, a boy stood there, he looked no younger than eighteen but no older than twenty-two. He was dressed in all black and a headset was on his black haired head, connected to a wireless battery pack clipped to his belt. His indigo eyes peered at the three behind a pair of glasses. Tomoyo requested to go back stage to greet the performers and congradulate them on a job well done but the boy shook his head, "Sorry, Tomoyo-chan. Yuuko-sama said no one is allowed backstage."

Tomoyo puffed out her cheeks in frustration, demanding to know why. Just then a low static was heard and a voice was talking to him through the headset. He cast his eyes to the side, listening.

"Are you busy tonight?" he asked suddenly and the group looked at him funny. Was he flirting with Tomoyo? Right in front of her brother?

The costumer looked to Kurogane, whom shrugged in return, glaring at the boy in the doorway.

"Yuuko-sama wants to have a cast party at Subaru and Kamui's restaurant," the boy seemed nervous.

"Oh! That sounds fun!" Tomoyo said in relief, for a moment believe that he was hitting on her. "What do you say Kurogane? Syaoran-kun?"

"That sounds like fun," Syaoran smiled at the girl, not really having a choice. It was dark and he would rather not walk home to his empty apartment. At least at the party he would find Fai and they could drive home in his car. It's just a restaurant, right?

Kurogane grunted his approval, only looking to please his sister.

"Great, we'll be there!" Tomoyo sang, "This is great! Brother gets to meet Fai-san and Syaoran can meet Sakura-chan!"

At this Syaoran blushed and nodded. Tomoyo smiled at the boy.

"Tomoyo-hime, I don't drink!" Kurogane cried as his sister practically dragged him down a block from the performance hall to a small bar tucked into the corner, Syaoran awkwardly following behind, having no choice as he had no ride home.

A sign hung outside of the door, swinging eeirily, a picture of owl eyes on one side and a cresent moon on the other, awfully similar to the logo of Souma's Academy's, and in between read "NOCTURNAL" in big yellow letters, underneath in smaller, white letters, "Restaurant & Bar". Syaoran sighed a little when he noticed the bar part and Kurogane looked at him; Tomoyo hadn't even noticed. She was used to this with the other parties that were held for the cast of the performances she worked in.

The door, a sliding shouji door was left open, a piece of paper taped under the 'closed' sign read "CLOSED FOR PRIVATE PARTY" in bold black letters. Little paper moons and stars hung in a golden array above their heads from fishline as they entered the building. Nearly every performer that was in the show was now, more or less, stuffed into the small confines of this restaurant. The tables and chairs from the restaurant portion of the domain were moved off to the sides, creating an empty area for mingling and dancing to the pop music playing in the background. Only one table, a booth, set in the corner of the large room next to the bar had people there. There was a young, slightly drunk brunette girl, the one at the end of the performance with the snowflake tutu next to a nervous looking pale man, the boy with the headset from earlier who had invited them to this, talking to an equally pale woman with long, straight hair who was laughing with a blonde male, the one with the stunning performance at the end of the show.

Fai.

Instead of the intricate designed costume or even a formal outfit like everyone else in the restaurant, he was dressed simply in light blue jeans with a hole on his right knee and a smaller hole on his left thigh, exposing smooth pale skin, a black ribbed tank top with a white wool sweater with a wide collar, so that it slipping slightly off of his left shoulder and showing a nicely carved collar bone. It was one of those December nights that Fai decided it appropriate that he wear his flip-flops, the thong on the shoes a white canvas material, matching his sweater. The hair spray was loosing hold of his hair, sticking out at some places and others falling down in soft waves. He looked odd being there with everyone else in their formal wear.

The woman in the booth next to him ruffled his hair and he laughed. She was wearing a very low cut, long sleeved, black dress that showed how proud she was of her womanly figure. Her hair was up in a pony tail on the upper left side of her head, hair so long and wispy that it swayed close to her hips and often in the pale boy's face as he tried to reach for a bottle of wine on the table, only for the woman to grab it first, taking a quick swig and handing it to Fai. She opened her eyes, reveiling cat like eyes that showed much knowledge, even in a drunken state; her mind was much older than her body. She turned back to the pale boy, who still wore the black get-up from when Kurogane saw him at the performance hall. Next to him, Sakura giggled at Fai and the woman, her green sleeve from her knit sweater running down her arm as it went up to cover her laugh. The sweater covered a pale yellow dress with a braided brown belt around her waist. A daisy clip held back her hair from her face.

They all laughed again, at the boy who got drenched in wine after wrestling it from Fai and the woman. Kurogane could hear Fai's delicatew laugh over everything in the restaurant and it was simply beautiful. Pale cheeks were flushed pink. The male stopped laughing and took a long sip from his glass, having poured wine into it before the boy got it. Several other glasses of tequila, vodka, beer, and sake littered the table with their empty bottle counter parts.

With everything happening around them Kurogane couldn't keep his eyes off the male. He hadn't even noticed that Tomoyo had dragged his body forward easily to the table, calling out to the people at the table, Syaoran following closely behind; the boy was blushing at seeing Sakura.

"Sakura-chan! Watanuki-kun! Yuuko-sama! Fai-san!" she called politely, stopping at the table.

Fai smiled at the girl before dragging her down into the booth with him for a hug, offering her a drink. She stood, thanking him for the offer and went to sit next to Watanuki, the only sober one in a ten foot radius besides the other new arrivals. Kurogane crossed his arms and sat next to his sister as Syaoran sat down next to Fai.

"Syaoran-kun~" Fai greeted the brunette, leaning on him. "What are you doing here?"

"You invited me to the performace, remember? I rode with Tomoyo-chan, since you took the car."

"Oh yeah," Fai giggled, getting off Syaoran and reaching over the table to the sake bottle and pouring him and Yuuko some into the shot cups spread in front of them.

"So, Tomoyo-chan, who is this?" Yuuko asked, sobering up a little in presence of a new face, her business woman mode unconciously kicking in.

"This is my brother, Kurogane," she introduced him, smiling and waving a hand towards him. "Kurogane, you remember Sakura? This is Yuuko-sama, the manager and owner of the academy, her assistant Watanuki-kun, and I told you about Fai-san earlier." Kurogane nodded to each of the people with a grunt. He didn't like tolerating with drunks much. At least these people were bearable. For now. He feared they would get worse. Little did he know he was right.

Yuuko lifted her shot glass up to him in a greeting, Watanuki had bowed as much as he could in his seat without headbutting a vodka bottle and Sakura greeted him happily as she hasn't seen the man in a long while.

"Kurogane? Like the martial artist, Kurogane?" Fai asked, leaning his chin into the palm of his hand, a content smile playing on his flawless face.

This surprised Kurogane, people rarely knew who he was. He had highly doubted that Fai, of all people, would know who he was. He as a dancer, a ballerino, for God's sake and an incredibly great one at that. He figured that the blond only had time for dancing and dancing alone. He nodded. "The one," he said confidently, seeing that he could get along with this man.

"Ahh," the man smiled even wider. He poured the shot of sake into his glass of wine, giving a twirl as he spoke, "I used to hear a lot about you, especially before I moved here. You do very well in what you do." He held up the glass to Kurogane, much as Yuuko had done earlier before drinking it. Kurogane smirked. Tonight couldn't be that bad.

Through the night, the table was littered with more bottles, people coming by now and then to give them more drinks. Lots of men came by and flirted with the drunk Yuuko and even more drunk Fai, adding more bottles to the growing collection on their table. Watanuki got up several times to clear the table, but everytime he came back, more bottles had appeared and soon he gave up and left it to the waiters to do that job. Tomoyo eventually got up and left, claiming the need to use the restroom and Sakura soon followed after her, having a little trouble walking. The two never came back, they probably got caught up with other ballerinas. Tomoyo's costume designs were one of the biggest talks of the party. Many of the dancers were surprised at her talent. Such elaborate threads looked heavy and uncomfortable to move in but they were exactly the opposite. One dancer even commented that they were much more comfrotable than her pajamas.

The table's group shrunk even further, having lost Syaoran from the group earlier in the night, the boy, not being a drinker, leaving to make friends with another group of people who seemed to be enjoying their sodas and teas rather than the booze. Yuuko had filled them in that they were indeed younger, in the learning part of the academy like Sakura was rather than the working part of the academy like Fai and Watanuki were. They were the type of kids who were convinced that their dancing would be ruined if they let alcohol taint their systems. They obviously hadn't met Fai yet, who drank vigorously through the night. Kurogane was a little frightened that the blond would get sick soon, passing out, but Fai stayed strong, having a strong defense against alcohol, according to Yuuko at one poiint during the night as Fai left to use the restroom and get another bottle of tequila and a beer for Kurogane, who sipped at it tentitavily through the night, not a big drinker himself. Who was going to pay for all this booze?

Also, through out the night, the more Fai seemed to drink, he gave everyone nicknames. And by everyone, just Kurogane. Apparently his durnken self found the many ways he could come up with and alter Kurogane's name, ranging from Kuro-tan, to Kuro-wan, and even calling him -chan at one point which bothered Kurogane. His enjoyment of the night was slowly decreasing, gripping the beer bottle as to not punch Fai and Yuuko.

Fai whispered something to the woman, Yuuko, and she laughed and pushed him playfully. Watanuki, apparently having heard a bit of their secret conversation blushed a bit and looked over to Kurogane, who was scanning the crowd for his sister. He saw black hair from behind and concluded it as her. He turned back his attention and witnessed Fai almost falling out of the booth and one could tell he was obviously more drunk than earlier. Getting his balance back, the blond man slid out of his seat, his face changing from a playful, drunk, child to a dangerously sexy, drunk, man as he circled the table to Kurogane. Yuuko was giggling behind her hand and Watanuki was blushing even more. They were the only two in the table that knew what Fai was doing.

The ballerino, noticing that Kurogane left no room at the end of the booth choosing to stay as far from the alcohol, and Yuuko, as possible why still enjoying their company, sat on the martial artist's lap, getting close to his face, one elbow on his chest as the hand stroked Kurogane's cheek as his other arm gently wrapped around the man's neck, rubbing the hair on the back of his neck erotically. He giggled a little, holding his face only a mere inch away from the others, their noses awfully close and he stayed that way when he spoke with a smirk, "So... what was your name again?" Fai said, a slight slur was added to his voice through the evening.

Kurogane scoffed, "Idiot, you forgot already? It's Kurogane." He had become accustomed to calling Fai various names, such as idiot. He tried to look away and distract himself as the male on his lap readjusted himself. Fai kept his hand on Kurogane's left cheek, leaving his only option of distraction either a blushing Watanuki and giggling Yuuko or the small hole in the fading red walls. He took much interest in the walls.

"Mm, Kurogane, eh?" Fai said rather sexily, running his smooth hand down Kurogane's face, to the collar of his button down, playing with the fabirc. His legs were now crossed, one flip-flop hanging off his toes, threatening to fall. Kurogane had not moved. He wanted the man to get off of him, but then again... "That's such a long naaame!" Fai suddenly transformed back into the playful drunk child, his hands leaving the man's chest and neck and to hold his cheeks, pinching the skin between his thumbs and fore fingers on both sides buch like an annoying aunt does to the neices and nephews that she missed but did not miss her. "How about... Kuro-tan! Or... Kuro-puu? Kuro-chan!"

"NO!" Kurogane nearly shouted, "Stop with these stupid nicknames!" He easily plucked the drunk man off of his lap and stood him up. He lied to himself; perfect doesn't exist.

Yuuko errupted into a full blown laugh from her giggling, causing some of the people to look over, but once they noticed that it was just Yuuko and Fai, they turned back around. Everyone knew that after the dress rehearsals for each performance, Fai and Yuuko liked to hold cast parties at Nocturnal as an excuse to get drunk and bother, or rather fully introduce themselves to the new members of the cast and crew. Today they were introducing Syaoran, Kurogane and a few others into the group. Elder performers had already warned the dancers such as Sakura and the people Syaoran were with and Syaoran already knew how Fai was because he lived with the man, so this was all very new to Kurogane, having just met the man. Fai giggled and poked Kurogane's nose, "I know! Kuro-puppy!"

"I'm not a dog!" Kurogane yelled.

"Ahh, Kuro-kun," Yuuko hummed, twirling her hair with one finger and swirling her martini glass in the other hand, "But you are." She then continued to giggle, finding everything around her extremely funny.

At first Kurogane had found the blond male interesting and attractive, but after this experience of him drunk and all these damn annoying nicknames, and calling him a puppy, of all things, he didn't think so much after. He stood up, going to use the restroom, scanning the area for Tomoyo, he was about ready to leave. Not seeing her, he went into the bathroom stall and called her cell phone.

"Yes, brother?" she said sweetly.

"Where are you?"

"Oh, I forgot to tell you that I left with Sakura-chan a while ago, she felt sick from drinking so I drove her home. She asked me to stay, so I'm going to sleep over her house tonight," Tomoyo explained a little nervously.

"You... What?" Kurogane sighed, rubbing his temples with one hand.

"I'm sorry, brother," she apologized then something hit her, "Is Fai being unbearable again? I wonder how Syaoran deals with him at hom-Oh no! I left Syaoran there!"

"Fai has become the most annoying person I have ever met," Kurogane groaned, "I'll find Syaoran and see you tomorrow, I guess."

He walked back to the table, looking for Syaoran on his way over. He figured he'd stay for a little while longer so that Syaoran can still chat and socialize until...

"Wahh, Kuro-puppy came back!" Fai called, leaping over to the male. He held a bottle in one hand, his sweater hanging dangerously low on his shoulder and he was missing his flip-flops. Kurogane spotted one on the table with the bottles over the blond's shoulder.

"Good doggy!" he heard Yuuko call from the table. "Always returning to his master!"

Kurogane turned around to leave before he even made it to the table, but Fai latched onto his arm, "Wahh, Kuro-tan, don't leave~." he whined. "Kuro-chuuu~." His eyebrow twitched and he made the man let go of him, watching him stumble back to the table.

The martial artist made his way to where he saw Syaoran and gestured the boy over.

"What's up?" Syaoran asked, sipping on a glass of water, "Where's Tomoyo-chan?"

"She left with Sakura. You live with Fai, right?" he asked gruffly, hands in his pockets looking for his car keys, praying that he didn't leave them on the table with Fai. Syaoran nodded. "Alright. I'm going to go home, make sure he gets home alive?"

"That's my specialty," Syaoran said, laughing at his own joke. When Kurogane looked at him he elaborated, "At cast parties, usually held here, Fai likes to drink until he can't walk and usually calls me to walk over and drive him back. I don't understand why he doesn't just leave the car with me so I don't have to walk in the dark at two in the morning."

Once Kurogane left the building, Syaoran said good bye to his new friends, exchanging numbers with hopes to hang out during th enext week and went to find his roommate, which wasn't all that difficult, considering that the blond was singing very loud about his love of booze with the owner of the company while Watanuki held his head in his hands, a little ashamed to be sitting with the two but not allowed to leave as Yuuko threatened him everytime he left.

"Syaoran-kun!" Fai slurred, caught by surprise, "I didn't know you came tonight!"

Okay, it was definetly time to go home.

"Do you have the car?"

"Yes, I believe I do~" Fai sang, pulling keys out of his pocket and jingling them in his hands. "But do we have to leave now?"

"Fai-san, please, I have a test coming up and I need to study," he lied, terribly, to the dancer so that they may leave. He didn't feel too bad about lying, knowing that the blond most likely wouldn't remember it in the morning. Fai was always too drunk to notice when he lied.

The blond said his fairwells to everyone at the party and handed Syaoran the keys, leaning on the younger boy, barely able to walk. He had lost both of his flip-flops, but Syaoran found them along the way.

The silver car was still parked in the parking lot and luckily unharmed in the late night. Checking the time, Syaoran saw that it was nearly two in the morning. No matter how drunk or when he started, Fai always managed to leave at two a.m. after cast parties. The drunk ballerino crawled into the back seat of the four door car, laying across the seats comfortably, taking off his sweater to use it as a pillow. Syaoran, completely sober, having only drunken tea and water through the event, drove them to their apartment, about two and half miles from the bar.

At a stop light Syaoran looked into the back to check up on Fai. The drunken blond had fallen asleep across the back, his cheeks flushed and drooling a little onto his sweater. When they had finally gotten home, Syaoran turned in the seat to nudge his roommate awake. Fai giggled and lazily swiped his hand at Syaoran's and sighed, "Kuro-tan..._ P__arfait_..."

**Good afternoon (my time), owls.**

**I don't know how long until I can update next. School, vacation, laziness. I will finish this though.**


	3. Chapter 3

Elbow, jab, knee strike, jab, round house, block, block, jab, elbow, breath, breath, breath, _focus_.

Jab, jab, elbow, palm strike, double round house, jump kick, jab, jab, breath, breath, breath, _focus_.

Knee strike, knee strike, jab, elbow, jab, elbow, palm, 360 kick, breath, breath, breath, _Fai._

Palm, round house, elbow, knee, jab, elbow, kick, kick, kick, kick, kick, breath, breath, breath...

"FUCK!" Kurogane cussed rasher loudly, punching the practice dummy fiercly enough to knock it to the ground, impressing a very excited toddler in the process. The small boy bounced up and down as he sat cross legged on the floor, clapping his hands, before leaping onto his feet and his feet drumming on the floor, running to the other practice dummy to strike it just had Kurogane had. An echo of a young yell, "fuck" was heard.

It had been a week since the night at the bar with the dance company and his sister and Fai's drunken voice calling him a puppy and those annoying nicknames still echoed through out his head. He had come to the academy Souma owned to relieve some anger building up in him, staying at home and watching martial arts competitions and reading magazines wasn't cutting it anymore. He couldn't understand why he was mad, he just knew he was. _This is stupid_, he thought to himself, _They're just some stupid nicknames from some annoying guy with a pretty face. I probably won't ever see him again, even if Tomoyo works with him. _

Souma popped her head out of the office where she was doing paper work and enrolling new students into her computer, the toddler who ran off being one of them. "What's got you so worked up?" She asked, her smile was mischevious. He would have raised his eyebrow but instead picked up the practice dummy and chose a staff from the ones hanging on the wall and tossed one staff towards the martial arts academy owner. She left her office and caught the staff easily, a questioning look in her dark eyes. It was her favorite staff he had thrown to her, stained a cherry wood red with golden caps at the ends and three golden rings screwed into place, one in the middle and the other two in between the middle ring and the caps at the end. One end cap read her father's name, the other her mother's and in the middle was her name.

"Just shut up and spar me!" the man yelled, cracking his knuckles and standing at his defense position.

Souma in turn twirled the six foot staff around in her hands and around her body with an amused expression. She walked around playfully, in an successful attempt to further aggrivate the male. She continued to walk behind him, but he turned each time she moved keeping her body in his line of sight. Never let your guard down. Keep focus. Relax. Relax. Rela-

"Will you fucking strike already?"

"Sweet sword weilding gods, what has your pretty pink panties in a bunch this afternoon? And will you quit cussing, there are still young children in the building?" Souma scolded the aggrivated man.

She went to strike, swiftly spin and kick the man as he jumped back, blocking her kick with his fore arm. She thrust down the staff to get his head and he rolled out of the way, jumping into an airial kick, landing on one knee and spinning, jab after jab raining down towards the woman who blocked them with the staff. This was too easy. She faked a yawn, pissing him off even further.

"You suck when your pissed!" She laughed and he growled, kicks now chasing her around on the mat. "Tell auntie Souma what's wrong."

"That."

Jab.

"Fucking."

Round house.

"Pracing."

Elbow strike.

"Little."

Knee strike.

"Annoying."

Double round house.

"Piece."

Palm strike.

"Of."

Trip.

"SHIT!"

The annoying blond had clouded his mind and he hadn't paid attenting to when Souma was under him, swiping the staff by his ankles. He jumped, but too late as the staff hit one of his ankles and knocking him off balance. He landed awkwardly on his left wrist and cussed. Souma put her staff down and went to him.

"Are you alright?" she asked with concern. Kurogane had injured his left arm a few years back when he studied martial arts in China and he often messed it up afterwards, having it become fragile over the years of hurting it.

Kurogane cussed, rubbing his wrist tenderly, looking around to distract himself from the pain only to see the object of his aggrivation standing in the window of the building, looking in. Fai had a sad look to his face and his blue eyes were not focused. It was like he was looking but not really seeing. He stood there for a few minutes before holding his head then walked away massaging his temples.

Souma crouched down next to Kurogane, using the staff to support her and with a whistle said, "Wow, he was really pretty," then smiled when she saw Kurogane absentmindedly nodding his head, silently agreeing with the statement. "Does it hurt to much that we need to stop?" she then asked, refering to his wrist.

"I'll buy a wrap to put on it later, but I'm not out yet!" he said, hopping back up.

Souma strutted back to her staff, twirling it around like a flagette before pointing it to Kurogane, smirking, "Well then, let us continue."

* * *

Fai wandered around the small grocery store, a plastic yellow basket hanging limply in his right hand with a can of pinapples craddled inside as he examined a bottle of pain medication in his left hand. He tossed it into the basket and walked through the aisle, looking at the other medications on the shelves. Aspirin, Aleeve, Tylenol, they were all the same, right? The hand that once held the bottle now massaged his temples as the sound of his flip-flops echoed through the nearly empty store.

It was a fairly new building, set up in a fairly new plaza just a block away from his fairly new apartment. Waking with a raging hangover from being at the bar again (late) last night, filled with flirting, drinking, more flirting, and more drinking, he whined for Syaoran to bring him medication for his headache before he realized the time and remembered that Syaoran would be in class at that hour. He also looked out of the window to see that Syaoran had taken the car. The blond dragged himself to the bathroom only to discover he used the last of the pills last week after the party at the bar, an empty bottle thrown into the sink before he slipped on his powder blue sweater with extra long sleeves and comfy black pants with his usual flip-flops and walked to the grocery store. It was a little cold out and people looked at him oddly in his thin clothes and flip-flops. On his way, he took the long way, he stopped at a small martial arts academy, having a detour down memory lane before he continued on his short journey. Squinting in the sun he also decided it was time to invest in a pair of new sunglasses and continued his journey with a hand hovering at his eyebrows to block the sun from his aching eyes.

_I love alcohol, but the hangovers I can live without,_ he thought sourly, closing his eyes and rubbing his left eye with the sweater sleeve that covered his hand. Opening his eyes, he found himself in the wine aisle. _The gods are trying to tell me something, _he smirked, looking at the array of red wines they had for his choosing. Choosing one bottle, he walked down further to the more exotic wines. Not looking where he was going, he ran into a muscular form.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I-" he looked up and saw Kurogane staring at the man, eyebrow twitching, "Ah! Kuro-woof!" The blond man smiled, putting a hand on his shoulder.

Kurogane gritted his teeth, resisting to smack the blond into the shelves of wine bottles, "Stop calling me that!"

"Aw, but it's such a perfect name for you, Kuro-puppy! A puppy who always finds his owner," he sang, holding his hands behind his back innocently and sliding back to avoid being hit by Kurogane's yellow basket of death. He looked into the basket Kurogane was holding. "ACE Bandages?" he questioned, reaching into the basket and pulling it out.

Kurogane shrugged.

"What for?" Fai sounded a little worried.

"I, uh, hurt my wrist while sparring," Kurogane's cheeked turned a little red. He never liked telling anyone when he got hurt doing martial arts. He barely had told his own family, even Tomoyo. When he had told his mother that he wanted to start doing competitions, she had scolded him, warning him off all the injuries she has seen martial artists sustain when her husband watch the matches on the television. But he was standing here, in the middle of the grocery store, telling a man he met barely a week ago that he hurt himself.

Fai stood still, looking at the information on the back of the bandages, but not really seeing it. This reminded Kurogane of earlier, when Fai was standing outside of the academy.

"Say, did you stop by a martial arts school on your way here?" he asked the blond man, snapping him out of his gaze.

"Yes, I did," he replied, handing back the bandages, "How'd you know?"

"I visit there often, my friend owns that business. I saw you in the window. Why'd you look so sad?" Kurogane asked.

Fai turned his gaze back to the wine bottles. Maybe another bottle would be a nice option. "I... I used to do martial arts when I was younger," he said, not looking at Kurogane in the face. "I stop by there on my way here sometimes when I miss it."

Kurogane raised his eyebrow again, he was doing that a lot today, when he saw the man smile. There was something off about it this time. It looked too forced. He watched the man as he chose one of the exotic white wines and put it in his basket. The contents of Fai's basket were weird to the dark-haired male, two wines, a bottle of pain medicine, a can of pineapples. But then again, his weren't any better, a bandage, some tofu and cilantro, a lightbulb, and air freshener. Clean linens.

"You have a high alcohol tolerance, don't you?"

"I guess you could say that," Fai laughed.

"You're so thin though," Kurogan noted, examining Fai's body structure.

"Years and years of practice," another fake smile.

"Well, I have to get going," Fai started again, noting that their conversation was over as Kurogane never replied. He was feeling odd with Kurogane staring at him like that. He mentally shivered, unsure of what thoughts he could be having. Some men have weird thoughts about Fai. He only knew because sometimes he would go to the bar and they would tell him. Or even try to act it out in the alley out back. "I'll see you around? You could always stop by the academy. Tomoyo is always there so it's not like you'll be a stranger."

Kurogane nodded and watched Fai as he waved and walked away, stopping at the end of the aisle to pluck out another bottle of wine at random and a can of green tea before leaving his line of sight.

There is no way a man of his size can drink all that by himself. At least no healthy way.

Fai walked as quickly as possible back home, taking the shortest way possible and taking the stairs two at a time up to the second floor, and slamming the door shut when he got there. He took off his newly purchased sunglasses, tags still hanging on to the frame, as soon as he entered his home. Careful with his precious cargo he set his wines in his cabinets in the kitchen. When Syaoran moved into the apartment with him, they agreed to split the rent evenly, one would pay for electricity and one for water one month and switch every month or so. They barely stayed in the apartment for long, Syaoran having school and work and Fai having dance and rehearsals, they mainly just went there to eat and sleep. Ocassionally Fai would skip out on the bar for a few nights and sit home and watch movies while Syaoran was out or sleeping. They purchased their own food, having seperate and labeled cabinets for foods they would share and foods that they claimed as their own. It was the same way in the bathroom, self purchased towels, toiletries, etc. Except toilet paper, obviously.

He popped two pills into his mouth for his headache, tossing the bottle into the sink in the bathroom with the other, empty, bottle before he cracked open the can of pineapples he bought, added a little vodka from the bottle he kept in the fridge to the mix of fruit chunks and juices, and with a fork popped them into his mouth one by one for dinner. He went to the living room to pop in a movie, probably Beetlejuice, having no plans for the night after the rough night he had barely 24 hours ago. Setting the can and utensil onto the coffee table, he closed the curtains and turned off all lights, leaving the room in nearly complete darkness, the black out curtains not completely blocking out the sun light.

Part way through the movie, just as Lydia was taking pictures of Barbara and Adam in their ghost sheets, the door clicked open and closed, almost in a slam before the echo of the keys dropping into a glass bowl along with other, unseen items. Fai paused the movie just as Syaoran walked into the room and flipped on a light. He looked flustered, his usual messy brown hair was (if possible at all!) even messier than ever. He sat on the couch, elbows on his knees, and hands on his face. Fai was stunned, his fork hanging out of his mouth, a piece of a pineapple occupying his mouth, waiting for its doom.

"Syaoran-kun?"

When the brunette peeked, Fai saw a little pinch of pink and the blond smiled.

"What happened? Who is she?" he teased.

"I went to the pharmacy by my school to get you some Advil because I knew you'd have a hangover after last night because you came in awfully drunk and-"

"Syaoran-kun," Fai interrupted, knowing if he didn't, the boy would ramble on about his drinking before he got to the real problem.

"Right, sorry. I, uh, ran into Sakura-chan," he said, gripping his knees and blushing a little bit more.

Fai smiled, "Ah! You have a crush on Sakura-chan!" he chimed, causing the student to blush even more, burying his head into the couch pillows. "Don't be so shy! It's adorable."

"I don't even have a chance with her," Syaoran said, muffled by the pillow.

"Don't be so negative!" Fai slapped him on the back and swiped the pillow from his grasp.

"She'll never like someone like me."

"Stop putting yourself down. She barely knows you. How about I set you two up on a date?" Fai wondered aloud, one arm wrapped around the pillow, holding it to his tummy, the other hand holding a finger up to his chin and his eyes gazing to the ceiling, following the fan blades as they circled dizzily in the air.

"On a... date?"

"Mhm~"

"You would do that for me?"

"Of course! What are friends for?" he smiled, jumping up, the pillow still clutched in his hand, "How about I set you guys go to Nocturnal? It's their monthly romance weekend this weekend, right? It'll be adorable! Even clearing some room for a dance floor this time." He used the pillow as a dance partner as he waltzed around the living room, twirling around the coffee tables and couches before hopping over the couch from behind to sit next to Syaoran, pushing the pillow against the boys cheek and making kissing sounds.

* * *

Sakura was stretching on the _barre_ when Fai walked into the studio the next day. He smiled at the girl as she greeted him.

"Where's Tomoyo-chan?" he asked, setting his stuff down and changing his shoes. There were no new performances to practice for, seeing as they just finished their last one almost two weeks ago. The new performance was only told to the crew portions of the academy such as costume and publicity but hidden from the dancers as a surprise. The two still liked to dance together, to keep up their skills. They practiced their solos and duets, but still in the same studio. No other people in the academy could practice with Fai without practically molesting him during rehearsals, male or female, and Sakura was shy with everyone else, being fairly new to the academy's family, only trusting Yuuko, Fai, and Tomoyo.

"She's in the shop upstairs working on sketches for the next performance. She won't tell me or show me what she's drawing!" Sakura huffed, checking her phone one last time before turning it off and putting it in the side pocket of her duffle bag before continuing to find a sutable pair of pointe shoes.

"Ah, a beautiful little costume designer, isn't a she?" he laughed, holding a hand to his temple, massaging it. The headache from his hangover had yet to go away. He dug in his bag for the bottle of pills he bought the other day and gulped another two down with water before changing from his jeans and sweater into his usual worn out t-shirt and sweats. He noticed Sakura looking at him as he was rubbing his headache away again, "Nothing to worry about, Sakura-chan, just a small headache. It'll go away." He smiled reassuringly at her.

She smiled back at him, retying the ribbons on her pointe shoes.

"Say... Sakura-chan?"

"Yes, Fai-san?"

"Do you remember Syaoran-kun?"

She looked up at him from her split, "Syaoran-kun...? Ah, the boy from the cast party with Tomoyo-chan and her brother?"

Fai nodded with a bright smile, "Yes, he's my roommate. What do you think about him?"

She looked at the floor in thought before getting up to switch legs. "He seems nice. I'd like to talk to him more. I left the party with Tomoyo-chan rather quickly. I also ran into him the other day at the pharmacy, but he ran off. His face was red, I guess he must have been sick. Why do you ask?" She looked back up at the blonde who has yet to begin his stretching, his armscrossed behind his back once again.

"Well, we were talking last night and you kind of came up into conversation and... What would you say if he told me that he wanted to... get to know you a little better? Say, over dinner? At Nocturnal's this weekend?" He said slyly, adding a little wink.

She blushed madly, coming up from her split into a butterfly stretch, "I don't know..."

"Please give him a chance?" he asked, giving her the puppy dog look as she turned her eyes to him.

"I guess I could..." she muttered, looking away, standing up from her stretching.

"Yay! I got Sakura-chan a date this weekend!" he danced around a little before nearly tripping over the clothes he never packed into his bag and laughing.

* * *

"I still can't believe you got me a date with her..." Syaoran said, playing with the stem of the pink rose held in his hand nervously.

"You better believe it, and stop playing with that rose, you'll ruin it before she gets here!" Fai said and the brunette immediately dropped the rose onto the bench next to him.

They sat outside waiting for Sakura, Fai leaned against his car parked along the curb next the benches that Syaoran sat on. Syaoran was dressed in nice dark jeans, his best pair, black shoes, white button up and brown blazer. Fai had attempted to comb his bird's nest of a hair but that became a lost cause as his hair would comb through but not look any different. On his way from the studio, Fai had found a pink rose and gave it to Syaoran to give to Sakura. Fai was dressed in his usual sweater and tank top combo-a white tank with a black sweater today with a wide enough collar to allow the viewing of his collar bones and the sleeves of the tank top-combined with his light blue jeans and white canvas flip-flops.

As soon as Fai recognized a car driving by to the parking lot to be Tomoyo's, who had promised to drive Sakura, he ruffled Syaoran's already, and always, messy hair, wishing him good luck and hopped into his car. Feeling a bit lonely, he took the opposite direction of his home, heading to Club TOWER (with a backwards 'R' for cool effect) for a few complimentary drinks from a few desperate gentlemen.

**Greetings, owls;**

**I really hope you enjoyed this chapter. I'm trying my hardest to keep posting on every Monday. Please tell me what you think about the story so far! I love hearing what you all have to say.**

**Until next time.**

**- Civetta**


	4. Chapter 4

"I still don't understand why the hell we're here," Kurogane grumbled, leaned back in his seat and crossing his arms.

Souma had decided after a few brutal sparring sessions that she needed a break, and a big one, then decided to drag along Kurogane too to her favorite club, Club TOWER with a backwards 'R'. He hadn't shut up about Fai since the party and it was getting on her nerves. He had met the guy once, that she knew of, and at that moment, he was drunk off his ass. He couldn't be that bad, could he?

The club was popular with the college students of the town, filled with people ranging from 21 to 30 or so, thought anyone rarely looked older than 27. The basic layout was that of a square. The entrance spliting into two hallways going to the left and right but ending up in the same area. Against the wall in the back was the bar, and opposite of that closest to the entrace was the DJ and his turntables with various sizes of speakers along the platform and hanging above and around the dance floor, that took up a majority of the club. Outlining the dance floor, that was tiled, was carpet with standing tables closest to the dancing bodies for people to stand at and mingle and drink. In another layer was more tables, these accompanied by stools and the third and last layer were booths with high walls in between with dark pleather seats and glass table tops. Hanging above were dim lights. In the back, by the bar, were two other hallway entrances, one at each end that lead to new hallways where the bathrooms and storages were. The two martial artists were currently taking up residence in a booth seat, close to the bar.

She giggled, the few drinks she had earlier catching up to her, "Oh, Kurogane, you have to loosen up! You can't please your _princess_ if you're always so grumpy."

"Tomoyo knows I'm always like this," he spat. "Besides, you know I don't drink, or dance, or socialize."

"It was worth a shot," she said and giggled, covering her mouth with her black fingerless gloves clad hands.

"What's so funny?"

"Haha, get it? I made a pun," with that she rose a shot glass and slurped it all up in one go and continued to laugh.

Kurogane rolled his eyes, sinking further into his seat at the booth, before deciding, finally to Souma's delight, that maybe a beer or two wouldn't hurt too much.

Fai weaved his way through the crowds, expertly feeling up males and females alike, winking here and there to the ones he found attractive and obviously found him attractive. He twirled a martini glass in his hand, sipping here and there. As soon as he'd run out of alcohol, he'd abandon the glass and flirt else where for another free drink like he had been doing all night. It was a rare occassion that he ever bought his own drinks when he went to the club. Having abandonded his sweater in his car, the sweat of dancing between equally sweaty bodies on the crowded dance floor to a heavy beat drenched his thin white tank top, leaving little to the imagination about what the cloth hid underneath. His jeans, the belt being lost after a very...hot... flirting session in the corner, fell dangerously low, exposing his hips bones and back dimples when his tank top rode up. Which it happened to do quite often, using this to his advantage of walking by tables and randomly stretching his arms high above his head, pulling the tank up with him. This is how he scored his next beer.

After leading on a few drunk girls with a wink, he wandered towards the tables and booths that outlines the dance floor. He had been there for hours and had yet to exit the dance floor, always being dragged into dancing with a man or woman and flirting rather hotly with some in the more busier and crowded areas.

Spotting a lonely lady, he went in for the kill.

She was attractive, dark skin, dark hair, and dark eyes. The glass topped table allowed him to see the short jean shorts she wore with black knee high boots, black and purple striped stockings peeking out above. She wore a low collared purple tank top with a long silver chain draping over her collar bones and bust. Hands wrapped in black fingerless gloves completed the outfit, coating hands the held the margarita glass she was sipping from. Her eyes scanned the crowd and stopped on Fai, spotting him approaching her. He slid on a sweet smile and slid into the booth right next to her.

"What's a lovely lady such as you doing so alone?" he asked, leaning onto the table with his elbows.

She blushed, "Oh, not this," she murmured and looked away.

Fai laughed, "I won't flirt if you don't want me to."

"That would be a good choice," she laughed too.

He raised a suggestive brow and smirked, "Oh really?"

"So, what's your name?"

"Ah-ah-ah, that's a secret," he winked, holding one finger to his lips, kissing it then sipping his beer.

"Well then, you can't know mine either," she winked back and sipped at her drink, mocking him.

"What do you do for a living?" she purred, grabbing onto his muscled arm.

"I dance," he whispered, leaning into her, rubbing his nose against her neck.

"Where do you dance?" she continued before gasping as his cool tongue licked up to her ear.

"It's not vital that you know," he said, a low rumbling in the back of his throat.

She purred, feeling up his chest, gliding across the damp fabric of his tank top to grasp his neck, pulling at his hair as he bit down on her neck. She had totally forgotten about the earlier conversation. Until foggy eyes spotted a familiar face across the bar eyeing her and the man she was with. She gently pulled away from Fai, who gave her a funny look.

"Just be patient," she winked, deciding to play along with his flirting game after all. She slid a hand along his thigh.

"Alright. Back to the question game then? May I know why you would grace such a club with your presence?" he asked, raising his hands, exposing shaved underarms to the world, gesturing to the club pulsing around them.

"Taking a break from the academy," she smiled, finishing off her drink.

Fai flagged down a wandering bartender, asking for a few drinks for him and the woman and handing him a few bills with a smile and a wink, "Academy?" he asked, finishing off his own beer.

"You didn't have to get me anything," she cooed, touching his arm, noting his structure with interest, "I own a martial arts academy."

Fai thought about all the martial arts academies that he knew of and began listing them off. She laughed at all the ones that weren't hers and went to talk about them compared to her own academy all the while the bartender came back, handing them their drinks that Fai had bought. Or that she thought Fai had purchased, seeing that the money that he handed the man was folded and neatly placed under a glass. She raised an eyebrow at him and he smiled at her, tilting his head to the side innocently, "How about, oh, what was the name... Sama's? Suma's?" He struggled to remember the name correctly, dramatically holding his hand to his head to give the illusion of deep thinking when he was actually just too drunk to remember.

"Souma's?" she corrected, laughing at the slightly drunk man's attempts at saying her name.

"That's it!" he laughed. "I walk by that place sometimes on my way to the grocer's."

"Is that so?"

"Very so. Say, you wouldn't happen to know-"

"What the hell are you doing here?" a gruff voice interrupted.

The blond turned around to face the voice and his bright blue eyes lit up and he pounced, "Kuro-puppy! Such a good puppy!" he called, forgetting all about flirting with Souma and drinks. He crawled onto the martial artist, climbing so that his arms hung around the man's neck and strong legs gripped him around his wasit, bare feet hooking at the front, flip-flops laying forgotten undernearth the table. Kurogane struggled to get the man off of him with a few cusses that were drowned away by the beating music around them. Fai just kept crawling away like a cat on a tree.

"How come every time I see you, there is alcohol in your grasp!" he yelled, finally managing to get the ballerino off of him.

"What can I say, I follow booze around as much as Kuro-puppy follows around his owner!" Fai laughed, leaning on the table and picking up a glass at random for a sip.

"What owner?"

"Me, of course! Silly Kuro-tan," he said, slapping Kurogane's upper arm lightly.

"Kuro-tan? Kuro-_puppy_?" Souma asked along with a laugh. "Kurogane, who _is_ this?"

"This is_ Fai_," Kurogane growled, sitting down at the opposite side of the table, as far away as possible from the drunk blond, just like when they first met. He stared at something other than his company, sipping at his light beer.

"So, this is the Fai you've told me about!" she exclaimed and Fai happily turned with a smile to her direction.

"Ah, so Kuro-wanwan has told you about me? That's so sweet," he chimed then moved to sit next to Kurogane, who scooted away every so often until he was stuck between a bonding Souma and Fai, angrily drinking his beer.

_He will die, _he thought sourly, gripping tightly on the bottle in his hand. Any harder then bottle would have burst.

"Kuro-chan, is Souma your girlfriend?"

Souma and Kurogane nearly spit out their drinks.

After an excruciatingly long bonding session between the two at his sides, Fai retreated, having run out of alcohol and went on his rounds to gather more to his collection.

"He drinks an awful lot, doesn't he?" Souma asked, having stopped drinking a while after Kurogane joined them. She looked a little concerned for her new friend.

Kurogane scoffed, "He drank more when I first met him."

Souma looked at him, mouth agape.

"He was singing and yelling and... _mewling_," he shuddered.

"Like a cat?"

"Unfortunatly."

"He's your little kitten!"

"What!"

"A lost kitten always finds its way home."

"When I'm done with Fai, you're next," he snapped, going back to the bar.

Kurogane watched Fai from his spot at the bar, how he swayed his way through the crowds, flirting and chatting away to all the males and females anxious for just a moment of this pretty blond's time. Something twisted in his stomach when he spotted the blond nuzzling some guy's neck, one arm around his back, the other cradling a shot of vodka and he turned away, concluding it was just a reaction to the alcohol he consumed. There was no way he was jealous. He didn't like Fai. The dancer was annoying and clingly and too feminene and cute and gorgeous and he did not just think that. He hasn't liked many girls in his years and definetly liked no guys at any age or time or anything.

The sound of the ballerino singing beat down the sound of the music in a race to Kurogane's ears and the man looked to see that he switched tables from the dark haired man he had been flirting with and went to spend time with the table filled with girls that Souma had taken residence in, making friends after Kurogane left her at the table. Instead of singing about his love alcohol, he sang about his surroundings, describing the girls around the table, the music played by the DJ in the club, and the atmosphere in not so lyrical terms that didn't fit together well, cutting off words to fit them into the stanza structure he set up in his mind. He even managed to understand, through a mumble of words over shadowed by a drunk pair laughing to the side of him at the bar, a verse Fai sang about Souma and Kurogane, complete with badly exicuted kicks and punches, tripping over himself in a drunken mess after a few kicks and landing on the floor. He laughed it off then suddenly went off to the bathroom, flirting and flirting along the way. _Probably looking to get even more drunk. This idiot is going to die of alcohol poisoning._

After ordering another beer, he followed Fai, discovering that he had made his way to the bathroom, the more secluded and quiet part of the club, if that were even possible. The DJ had practically insisted on turning up the music all the way, nearly blowing out all the speakers in the club. Scattered through the hallway were random fake plants and Fai had seemed to make friends with a tall palm tree, talking to the object if it were a real person.

"Why won't you dance with me, Kuro-tree?" Fai whined, tugging on one of the palm's leaves.

Kurogane sighed. He couldn't believe this. It was funny and cute, he had to admit, but how drunk did you have to be to mistake Kurogane, tall, tan, short dark hair, muscles obvious through the sleeves of his black t-shirt with a fake palm tree, tall, thin, long, waxy leaves, no arms to show off any muscles? The dancer wasn't exactly the image of sober either, face flushed, eyes glazed, movement fluid and clumsy and awkward. If he weren't leaning on the wall against the tree, he surely would have been on the floor. How he was even still awake was beyound the taller man.

"Kuro-tree!" Fai said, tugging harder on the leaves and the tree almost attacked the blond, almost as to say, "I'm not Kuro-tree! Stop pullin on my leaves!" leaning dangerously towards Fai and would have fell if Kurogane hadn't tugged it in the opposite direction way from Fai.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Kurogane snapped at the blond.

"Hell think you're doing the what do you?" Fai retorted, folding his arms with a drunk, smug smile like he had just said the most quotable comeback in history.

"You're so drunk."

"I'm so not!"

"Yes, you're trying to get a tree to dance with you!"

"Am not! If you don't remember, I was clearly asking you, Kuro-wan," Fai smiled. "This tree is not nearly as cute as you are."

Kurogane gave up, tugging on the blond's hand, dragging him away from the wall. Fai almost fell upon the man, stumbling on his barefeet. The martial artist held the man up by his shoulders.

"Aw! You do want to dance!"

"Shut up, idiot!"

"Let's dance, Kuro-puppy!"

"I'm not a puppy!"

"If you don't want to dance, then let's sing!"

"What? No, don't-"

"If I had one love and one love only, I would only love Kuro-tan~ My hero, my savior, my only looove!"

"Shut up!"

"You're not fun!" Fai laughed, hanging his arms loosely around Kurogane's neck.

"C'mon, we're going home," Kurogane growled, picking up the flip-flops thrown to the side and throwing one of the man's arms around his shoulder and holding him up so he could help the durnken man walk.

"Go through here," Fai slurred, pointing to a door near the end of the hallway. "That's where I usually park."

The exited and Fai, somehow unlocking his car, climbed into the driver's seat and stared at the steering wheel as if waiting for it to do something.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Kurogane scolded, opening the door and trying to pull the man out.

"You said we're going home!"

"You can barely walk, and you want to_ drive_?"

"I'm a great driver," Fai smiled a lopesided smile, patting the gear shift tenderly.

"Nope, no, no, no, you're not driving. Come on, we're using my car," he pulled the man out.

"Waaait, get my sweater! It's cold!" Fai squealed, diving back into his car, grabbing the black sweater from the back seat of the car struggling to get it back on. After some help from Kurogane, he finally got it on, his hair ruffled, long bangs covering half of his eyes as he looked up at the man and smiled again. "I'm happy."

"I'm sure you are, come on," Kurogane turned to leave. Noticing that Fai wasn't followed, he looked back.

"Kuro-tan..." Fai started, swinging his legs outside of the car. "I forgot how to walk."

It was going to be a long night.

Kurogane had carried and made Fai get into the back seats of his car, and he lay sprawled across, one foot set up on the window, one hand covering his eyes, the other tracing invisible things on the ceiling of the car as he sang under his breath about life. He seemed to have calmed down after he forgot how to walk. Kurogane had little struggle driving, admitedly having a few drinks, but his tolerance level was high so he was practically sober. The car was quiet but for Fai's low singing, which was slowly morphing into mumbles then humming. Kurogane had recognized one of the hums as the song he danced to at the performance he had attended with Tomoyo. He smirked, taking a left turn onto the main street.

"Oi, where do you live?" he asked, coming to a stop at a red light. Rain drops began to fall, glittering the window with clear drops of liquid. Not recieveing a response, he turned around, "Hey, where do you-" but cut himself off, noticing that the man was asleep-an arm draped across his eyes, the other across his stomach, the leg still propped on the window, the other bent up at the knee, flip-flops on the floor, mouth hanging open a bit. It was rather adorable, Kurogane had to admit, even with the little line of drool that hung out of the corner of his mouth. He nudged the man's leg but not even a grunt. He was out cold. Cars began to honk at him and he realized the light had turned green. He took the next left turn, deciding to head to his house, a lone finger standing tall as he raised his arm outside of the window as a goodbye to the drivers behind him.

He lived a few miles out of the main town, in a small house snuggled between other small houses. It was a simple, one bedroom, one bathroom, kitchen, living room, office, small garage, small backyard, small drive way, everything small, simple, and to the point. He was usually out of town because of his competitions so he never bothered to get a bigger house. It was already paid off, having lived in it since he was eighteen and comfortable. It had all his needs, and was close to the town so he could drive the five minutes to Souma's or the grocery store. He turned into the driveway and went to awake his new guest.

"Wake up, idiot," he grumbled, tired and wanting to go to sleep.

"Mm, _parfait_..." Fai groaned, turning in the seats to face the back.

"What are you talking about, 'parfait?' Are you hungry? I'll give you food if you fucking come inside," Kurogane argued with the unconscious man. He shook fai more until unfocused blue eyes met red. "Come on."

Fai turned and crawled out of the vehicle with the help of Kurogane and they stumbled inside. Kurogane's home was simple, a small hallway with a lone table to the side opening up to the living room to the left and the kitchen to the right, each room seperated, the kitchen by a bar like wall lined with two stools and the living room with a small black couch. Towards the back were shoji styled doors that were currently open, allowing the viewing of his messy bed, some of the pillows on the floor, the blanket pulled back, not having been fixed when the martial artist woke that morning. Above the bed were two swords, one long and one short, the short hanging above the other. In the other corner was the office, which was refurnished to be a small workout room with a punching bag, a few weights, and a yoga mat.

In between the "office" and bedroom was a doorway to the bathroom. Along the wall space was framed pictures and news paper clippings and hanging medals. In the living room was a shelf dedicated to just his trophies.

The blond, now awake, noticed everything with bleary vision, "You do martial arts?" he slurred.

Kurogane grunted in reply and Fai took it as a yes, as if it weren't obvious by his surroundings.

"My friend, he did-" he hiccuped "-he did martial arts too. He was really good. One of the best," he smiled sadly. Kurogane lifted an eyebrow to the man, helping him walk over to the bed past the shoji doors. "I used to go to every one of his competitions. He was amazing. He tried teaching me, but everytime I kicked, I'd end up dancing. I'm a, a dancer, y'know?" he laughed and tripped over a shoe that sat on the floor, perhaps looking for his lost buddy. "He worked hard. Wass really good..."

"Why are you talking in past tense?" he grumbled and Fai reached out to the bed and lay down, cuddling with a pillow.

"He's dead now," Fai whispered before falling back asleep on the bed.

**I CAN'T BELIEVE I ALMOST FORGOT IT WAS MONDAY.  
I'm so sorry, my owls. I really hope you enjoy this chapter! The next one may come up later than I want it to. My dad installed this neat thing on our TV that allows me to watch _SOOO much anime_ and I have virtual school classes. Also this weekend is WARPED TOUR. I'll try to update on Monday, but no promises. I'm sorry!**

**- civetta**


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